Saturday, April 15, 2006

Becky and I celebrated our thirteenth anniversary last night. Grandma and Grandpa Duke watched the boys, while Becky and I checked into the Hilton near Dupont Circle. We went out to Olney, Maryland to eat dinner and see a show.

I made reservations at a small hole-in-the-wall Belgian restaurant called Le Mannequin Pis--I had read about it in the Washington Post. The food was really, really delicious! The ambiance was great, like one of those quirky little restaurants you seem to only find in Europe, with kitschy little posters on the wall and a peeing-boy fountain at the bar. They specialize in Belgian ales, but I had wine instead.

Becky had a tossed salad, and I had escargot for appetizers. Then, I had the special--duck breast with plums on a bed of wilted spinach. The duck was good, but what Becky had was better. The restaurant specializes in mussels, and they have a whole menu devoted to just mussels. Becky had a one kilo pot with horseradish, garlic, rosemary, celery and onions and pommes frites on the side. She ate half; I ate my dinner and the other half of hers. (It was my day off for Body For Life!)

Then, we finished off with a chocolate dessert. I forget what it was called, but it was like two slabs of fudge with almonds in it, on a plate of raspberry sauce. Add a cup of decaf for Becky and an espresso for me, and Delicious!

After dinner, we went out to the Olney Theatre to see Anything Goes (by Cole Porter, et. al.). The show was very good. All of the actors performed really well, and it was a very entertaining show. It's nice living in an area like D.C., the quality of the theater is so good. You can tell that these actors are "on the rising side" of their careers. It beats the community theater quality stuff you see in other places. I only wish the boys could have seen the show. Had it not been so late, they would have really enjoyed the show, especially the large ensemble tap dance numbers near the end of both acts.

This morning, we awoke at a leisurely 7:30 (leisurely for us!), and had breakfast in the hotel restaurant: eggs benedict (of course) for me, and a vegetable fritata for Becky. It was a pretty nice evening/morning.

When we got home, Grandpa reported that the boys were very good. He slept in our bed last night to be closer to the boys, and was rudely awakened at 4:45am when my alarm went off. Oops! Between that and the cuckoo clock, I don't think he got much sleep last night.

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Important Quote

"If we are to have peace on earth ... our loyalties
must transcend our race, our tribe, our class, and
our nation; and this means we must develop a world
perspective. No individual can live alone, no nation
can live alone, and as long as we try, the more we
are going to have war in this world. We must either
learn to live together as brothers or we are all
going to perish together as fools."